 When deciding on a movie, people often look at movie posters to gauge their interest.  Movie posters offer a window into the heart of a movie.  As such, these posters attempt to grab the viewers' attention and convey the movie theme in a way that is appealing to the target audience.  Kid friendly movies usually contain smiling, brightly-colored cartoon figures, while dramas contain more serious, realistic figures.  They are carefully designed in order to most affectively spark the interest of their target audience and convey the theme of the movie.  Although these posters may seem simple or basic at first glance, a lot of thought and creativity goes into them.  The movie poster for the Silence of the Lambs is made up of a white face with red eyes, a death's head moth over the mouth, and text to accompany the image.  In the movie poster for the Silence of the Lambs, Dawn Baillie uses color, symbolism, perspective and text in order to design a poster that affectively conveys the movie's terrifying and violent nature.  

For the most part, the poster consists of red, orange, white, and black hues.  Red is used to convey a feeling of terror as it symbolizes blood, death, and violence.  This directly corresponds to the movie since one of the main characters is a violent psychopath named Dr. Hannibal Lector.  Automatically, the viewer can sense that the movie will probably have elements of horror in it.  The eyes are likely colored red in order to convey the message that by watching the Silence of the Lambs viewers will be witnessing a large amount of cruelty and evil.  The title is an orange color, which symbolizes the ambition that can be seen through Clarice Starling's character.  Throughout the entire film, Clarice, a student in training to become a member of the FBI, is constantly looking for clues and putting herself in danger in order to track down the serial killer known as "Buffalo Bill."  One significant example of her courage is how Clarice repeatedly decides to talk to Hannibal Lector in order to gain knowledge about the case even though he is an extremely dangerous cannibal and serial killer.  From this orange title, one can gather that although this movie is going to contain elements of horror and death, there will also be elements of courage; it points to the fact that there will be a hero in the movie.  The white and black colors symbolize good and evil. For example, the majority of the face is white in order to communicate that there will potentially be a force of good nature and heroism.  This white color is sharply contrasted with a black shadow on the right in order to draw a distinction between the forces of evil and of good.  This contrast of colors can be seen in words, "from the terrifying best seller" which are colored white against a dark background in order to grab the viewer's attention while hinting at the battle between good and evil.  On the poster, the black, evil force seems to be creeping up on the white and in doing so, foreshadows the fact that the villain of the movie, will end up sneaking up on not only the innocent, but also the heroine of the story.  This can be seen when Buffalo Bill kidnaps the innocent Catherine Martin after she offers to help him move furniture into his truck.  Similarly, as Clarice uncovers more information and gets closer to solving the mystery, she also begins to put herself in more danger.  Near the end of the film, Clarice unknowingly walks into the house of "Buffalo Bill," after getting a tip that the owner of the house may have information about the killer and nearly gets killed by the psychopath himself.

There are also a number of symbols on the poster that are indicative of key elements in the movie.  The most significant symbol is the reference to lambs in the title.  Through a biblical lens, lambs are often associated with innocence.  This relates to the face on the poster because it has an innocent look to it, and since the title is the Silence of the Lambs, the viewer now knows that this innocence is going to be taken.  Lambs are also sheared of their fur in order to create wool clothing, which is symbolic of how Buffalo Bill's victims are sheared of their skin in order for him to make his "skin suit."  Another symbol would be the moth, which is placed over the mouth of the face.  In the movie, this rare moth that can only be found in Asia is found in the throats of the killer's victims and has, quite literally, silenced the lambs, or the innocent women who have been killed.  The moth also has a skull on its back, which, again, is a symbol of death.  Moreover, these death-foreshadowing insects can only be found when examining a dead body.  The last symbol is the fact that the poster focuses solely on a head and does not contain a body.  This is symbolic of the fact that this movie is going to be a psychological thriller that messes with one's head.  During the film, Clarice is constantly trying to get into the mind of the killer in order to solve the mystery, and Dr. Lector is constantly trying to get into Clarice's mind with his clues and riddles as to whom the killer is.  Much of the movie revolves around this twisted, psychological element represented by the head on the poster.          

Perspective is one of the main elements of design used in the Silence of the Lambs movie poster.  Looking at the poster, the viewer is in very close proximity to the face.  Because of this closeness, it can be argued that the viewer is looking through Dr. Hannibal Lector's eyes, into Clarice's.  After having seen the movie, it seems as though it cannot be a coincidence that one of Dr. Lector's most famous lines spoken to Clarice is "closer Clarice" and the movie poster is a close up of what could be Clarice's face.  Since the face's eyes are red, it could also be an indication that Dr. Lector's evil nature is being reflected in Clarice's eyes.  In the movie, Dr. Lector tells Clarice, on several occasions, to come closer to his glass jail cell, until the two are almost face to face.  This demonstrates how important closeness is to Dr. Lector.  He uses this in order to get inside of Clarice's head and to mess with her mind.  He also values closeness because he eats his victims, which requires him to be very close to them.  This perspective offers additional layers of information to the viewer, hinting at the complexity of the film's plot.  

Lastly, the text on a movie poster is deliberate and significant. Unlike the symbolic elements of the poster that can be very subjective, the text is objective. It is usually very limited and important. On this poster, three famous actors' names are clearly placed under the face's chin in order to give it credibility.  The title is written in a large, orange font in order to stand out next to the smaller, white text.  Under the title are the words "from the terrifying best seller" which indicates that the movie was originally a novel that was good enough to be made into a movie.  Finally, credits and other information can be found in thin letters at the bottom of the poster.  This hardly noticeable, let alone readable, font is used in an effort to convey necessary details without overwhelming the viewer and complicating the poster.  

An immense amount of thought goes into the creation of a movie poster, and this can be seen in Dawn Baillie's the Silence of the Lambs through her use of color, symbolism, perspective and text.  By contrasting dark and light colors, Baillie communicates the fact that this movie will involve forces of good and evil.  Through the use of red, she is able to portray the violent and terrifying nature of the movie. Finally, the orange represents the ambition that can be seen throughout the movie.  Symbols like lambs, the moth, and the head on the poster give the viewer hints about key themes in the movie, and the text identifies important information about the movie. After combining these design tools, the importance of movie posters becomes apparent.  These posters have the potential to "hook" the reader into seeing the movie.  They are a form of advertising at its best, and it is no wonder people often decide to keep and display posters of their favorite movies.    

